


Have I Known You Twenty Seconds Or Twenty Years? (I Only See Daylight)

by noahs



Category: Fashion Model RPF, Taylor Swift (Musician)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Brunette Karlie returns from war, F/F, Friends to Lovers, Overdramatic Taylor, Song:Daylight (Taylor Swift), Soulmate-Identifying Marks, THE ROMANCE OF IT ALL, aint forgetting scott is a republican, and soulmates aus are so superior, bc i was thinking about those lyrics in lover, briefs mentions of swiftgron and taymily, daisies, how they give soumate vibes, lets say this fic is set in 2014, lover song of the century i think, taylors is a horsegirl, wanted it to be the 240 work but someone beat me to it, wtf i thougth this was a dead ship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-11
Updated: 2019-12-11
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:56:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,876
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21755095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/noahs/pseuds/noahs
Summary: "real love shines golden like starlight, and doesn’t fade or spontaneously combust."or the soulmates au where you have a mark that dosen't complete until you realize you are in love with your soulmate.
Relationships: Karlie Kloss/Taylor Swift
Comments: 12
Kudos: 82





	Have I Known You Twenty Seconds Or Twenty Years? (I Only See Daylight)

**Author's Note:**

> kaylor is dead my friends so go ahead and read this under you own precautions

_"And there’s something to be proud of about moving on and realizing that real love shines golden like starlight, and doesn’t fade or spontaneously combust. Maybe I’ll write a whole album about that kind of love if I ever find it."_

_-Taylor Swift, 2012, prologue from RED._

The first time that appears, Taylor is five, so entertained playing with her cat's fur that she doesn’t notice her skin getting marked by black ink.

The pain however, she notices, and it has her releasing a piercing wail as she cries for her mommy.

Her daddy comes instead and scoops her on his arms while she keeps crying. It hurts so much and she only wants her mommy. He carries her inside and sits her on his lap, rubbing her back. The pain worsens and she squirms trying to escape of his grasp but her daddy only holds her tighter.

"Scott, stop! It's on her back, you are hurting her!" Her mommy's voice rises above her cries and she feels familiar hands grabbing her gently. She buries her head on her mommy's shoulder, grabbing her sweater with her fists.

"It's okay sweetie, the pain is gonna pass very soon." Her mommy's comforting voice makes her feel a tiny little bit better. Taylor remembers once getting stung by a bee and she imagines this is what it would be getting stung by fifty of them.

She passes out, her little body unable to deal with the pain conscious and she's painless at least

*

When she wakes up on her fluffy bed with her horse blanket pulled over her shoulders, her mommy sits at the foot of the bed with a face Taylor doesn't like because is the same face she makes when she gets scolded.

Her mommy sighs and explains to her with the same voice she uses to read her stories that there's a thing called 'soulmates'; persons that are bound to find each other with their drawings on her bodies and what happened to her earlier was her body getting her mark.

Taylor doesn't understand of course, she only knows that she doesn't want to feel that pain ever again but she still listens wistfully to her mom and can't help but ask: “Are you and daddy soulmates?

Her mommy eyes glisten with something Taylor is too young to understand.

"No."

Her brows furrow. "But you love daddy."

Mommy takes her hand on hers. "I love your daddy very much. But soulmates don’t always end up together."

"Why?"

"Because that's how life works"

"Why?"

Mommy sighs. " I don't know honey"

"But you always have all the answers!"

"Not this time"

Taylor pouts. "What's the point of having a drawing then."

Her mom states down at her, brow furrowed."Soulmates are worthy all the pain Taylor, don't ever forget that. "

Taylor doesn't think so. She doesn't think a person is worth feeling like thousands of Mrs. Fluffy scratches on her body. But her mommy is smiling and she doesn't want to take that away.

"Can I see my mark? " She asks instead.

"It's on your back sweetie. We are going to need a mirror. "

Mommy brings a hand mirror and makes her stand in front of the body mirror without a shirt. Taylor giggles at her naked belly.

"Here, can you see it baby?"

Taylor can see it. But she doesn't understand what it is; it just looks like a curvy line over her shoulder plate. She felt so much pain for a line?

Her eyes get watery.

"What is it?"

"My mark is ugly."

Mommy laughs and her pout increases. "It isn't finished yet. It's going to complete itself as you grow older but it won't be whole until you met him."

"Him?" Taylor scrunches her nose. Boys drool and are smelly. Her baby brother Austin is the living proof.

Mommy laughs again but Taylor doesn't find it funny. “Yes, you gonna met your knight in shiny armor someday."

"But I am knight!" To prove her point she roars and rises her fist, losing ground and stumbling backwards with a loud thump.

Her mommy laughs louder.

//

At sixteen years old, Taylor can't still imagine losing her mind over a boy.

However, she can imagine losing her mind over Emily Poe and her lovely lips.

Emily who knows how to ride horses,

Who plays the flute flawlessly and holds her hand on the tour bus.

Emily who has an unfinished black guitar as a mark in the inside of her arm.

Emily, who says she likes boys but goes to her tiny bed on the tour bus every night.

The first time that it happens, Taylor goes to her mom with shaky hands because Mom is always there and Mom is gonna listen to her.

"Have―can―two people of the same sex be soulmates?"

Her mom looks at her slowly and Taylor begs whatever that is up there that she passes this off as curiosity.

"Well yes, soulmates isn’t just restrained to people of opposite sex. But it’s less unheard of, you know.” Her eyes narrow. “Most persons want to keep quiet about it.”

Oh, she knows. Taylor nods feeling her feet stuck to the ground. Mom takes her hands in hers and rubs it softly.

“You know you can tell me anything, right?” She squeezes her hands. “Anything.”

Taylor nods again, turning away with her heart on her throat.

But not before seeing the suspicion on her mom’s eyes. _Fuck._

_.._

It happens in the worst way. She was going to tell them, even if she was afraid of her dad’s reaction, of what would this mean for her musical career because she can’t―

She was going to tell them.

Instead, her mom and publicist catch her making out with Emily in bathroom. It’s bad, there’s a lot of yelling, and Emily repeating all over again that she doesn’t like women,

She isn’t sure what happens next, but that’s the last time she sees Emily Poe. She knows vaguely the details, Emily is moving away to study law and she doesn’t dare to ask. She makes a goodbye video only because her team tells her to and because this is the only way she can say her goodbyes.

She wishes she could do something but as Taylor learns soon there isn’t much she can do.

Her publicist comes to her and says, “Any other secret you might want to tell me?

Her shoulders hunch. “It wasn’t a secret.”

“You certainly didn’t tell no one.” Paula sighs. “Look, Taylor for this to work I need to know everything and by that I mean absolutely everything. There’s no keeping secrets with me, as your publicist I need to know everything ahead. If not, this isn’t going to work out kid. You choose this life and that meant giving away your privacy.”

Taylor feels offended. Of course she wants to be a famous singer but she’s still a person who deserves privacy above it all,

“I don’t―It’s unfair.” That’s the only words that manage to escape her throat.

“You better get used to it if you want to make it far. Look kid, you are not the first lesbian in Hollywood, and surely you won’t be the last, is not a big deal. But it can be if you don’t tell us, can you imagine what would have happened if someone else caught you, posted in on the Internet? You are a country star kiddo, what you are trying to start here would be over already. “

She touches Taylor’s arm with a hand that feels cold and heavy. “We spend a lot of money on you. Don’t disappoint us kid.”

She writes a song at least and gives away a piece of herself in that because that’s the last Emily will have of her. ‘Breathe’, she calls it, and if colors were emotions, Taylor would be black and white.

..

She can't look at her Mom in the eye.

“Taylor,” Mom says and Taylor unwraps as the most fragile flower, reduced to a sobbing mess.

“I was going to tell you, I swear I was going to tell you.”

“Taylor.” She repeats and Taylor sobs harder.

“I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.”

“Taylor you don’t have nothing to apologize about. I understand why you kept this from me but you should have told me.” Her hand rests on her shoulder, warm and familiar and it only makes her want to cry more.

“Aren't you mad?” ‘you don’t hate me?’ is what she really wants to ask but she isn’t brave enough.

“Taylor, you are my daughter, don’t ever forget that okay? I held you from the first time in a cold December night when you were a tiny baby with a red face and a mop of curls and now I’m holding you, my daughter. So what if you like women? That doesn’t make you any less my daughter." She kisses her forehead. “I will always love you.”

“I was so scared, I’m sorry.”

Her mom hugs her and she melts into the hug as if she were five years old again, and it just her mom and her against the world for a moment again.

“I’m worried about dad.” She breathes out.

Mom rubs her back. “You don’t have to. I know he loves you as much as me.”

*

Paula brings the subject first. 

“Where’s your mark?”

“On the back.”

“Okay, easy to hide.” Paula smiles relieved and Taylor can understand that because how is she going to fool anyone that’s she in love with the men she goes out with if her mark indicates the contrary?

She just lets her mark be seen one time so people won’t ever ask her about it and when her back needa to be bare they give her a special makeup to conceal it. People doesn’t care because celebs have been doing this for years now. It’s not new and is very common.

Celebs, soulmates and headlines don’t mix up well so Taylor is happy to have hers hidden.

*

She’s mad at Emily for a while, mat at her for giving up so easily but as time passes and she keeps getting more famous and holds a Grammy at the age of twenty she wonders if they really had a choice. She couldn’t have done anything different, really.

She wasn’t expecting to get this famous this fast, not on her second album at least. She thought it was going to be more a steady rising kind of type but now she has skyrocketed and people that didn’t pay her no mind are now fighting for just a second of her attention.

She tries to stay away from girls but fails miserably, and she founds out rather quickly that if there’s a place for people like her, Hollywood is. She understands Paula’s under impressed stare at catching her with another woman now. The all keep it a secret so well and Taylor figures she can play their game too.

She has short romances, never holding her heart out, without really meaning or feelings, careful to keep her heart and reputation safe. After Emily she knows better than to fall in love with the first pretty girl that bats her eyelashes at you.

And then Dianna Agron happens and everything goes kinda to hell.

Dianna’s mark is a crown in the inside of her wrist, and it looks finished but she keeps saying the ink on the inside is missing and Taylor believes her.

She wants to scream for the whole relationship. It’s a rollercoaster being with her, having her uncertain of every move, anxiety at every one of her decisions, shaky steps stumbling towards an unknown end that has Taylor wondering if it is worthy.

Everything with Dianna feels very fragile, very tentative. It was like getting on a car without knowing the directions, just keep driving trying to get somewhere you don’t know and hoping you won’t crush.

And sometimes when she kisses her, she hopes for the blinding pain, for her mark to get completed because she knows she loves Dianna, she can feel it on her skin when she touches her, on the way she gets dizzy with happiness and writes songs about it. At the way she feels like she’s gonna burst with affection towards the other blonde.

And she is certain of her feelings but the pain never comes and every day she looks at her back praying for it to get completed because at least she would get a sense of security, of what is meant to be in this shaky relationship. If Dianna is her soulmate then they are meant to stay together.

But another times she’s grateful it isn’t finished because she wants to think fate wouldn’t be that cruel to make Dianna her soulmate, not when she breaks ever promise and with them Taylor’s heart.

It burns where Dianna touches her and if colors were emotions, she would be red. Burning and burning until she’s reduced to mere ashes, left to pick up the pieces.

The night she leaves Dianna her skins burns and when the pain finally passes, she looks at herself in the mirror as if she were looking at her body for the first time and sees the same curvy line she got at five but on her left shoulder blade this time.

She can make out what it is now,

Wings.

//

Selena laughs at it at first. “So first of all, is your soulmate like an angel or something?

Taylor entertains her. “Maybe I’m gonna fall in love with a Nephilim after all.”

“I can’t see it as you are the pure devil.”

Selena isn’t fast enough to catch the pillow that is thrown on her way and is Taylor’s turn to smirk.

//

Taylor doesn’t realize it at first. She doesn’t think nothing of it when she’s asked to perform at Victoria’s Secrets Fashion Show besides that she doesn’t know how she’s supposed to sing without drooling at the models.

“It will be really hard not get distracted by the models” She tells Selena who’s sitting on the couch of her rented NYC department being a pain on the ass again.

Selena sighs dreamily. “Yes, the Angels are gorgeous.” Taylor feels her stomach dropping.

“What did you say?”

“What?” Her friend blinks at her. “The models are called Victoria’s angels didn’t you know?”

“Angels.” Taylor repeats and Selena’s eyes wide in realization.

“I thought―“ her voice trails off. After too much thinking she decided that her soulmate had to be an actress who played an angel in a movie. It was the way it made sense on her head, but now she’s glad that she is not right because actresses are too damn dramatic and she’s the over dramatic one already. She doesn’t think two dramatic women would make a good combination.

“Your soulmate is a model! Aww, how cute is that! A model and a Rockstar falling in love with each other!”

“I’m not a Rockstar.” She replies softly with a faint blush on her cheeks.

But she does feels like one, performing along Falling Out Boy, wearing a dress with the England flag stamped on it, crowd cheering and models passing by and she doesn’t think about soulmates until Karlie Kloss touches her hand. It isn’t more than a faint linger but it catches her attention.

She had already met the girl backstage and felt entailed by the fairly butterfly who was talking to her excitingly as if they were friends already. And maybe they were, Taylor thinks, because they get along so well and they go from acquaintances to friends in a day. They click right away and Karlie swears they have met before a couple of times but Taylor doesn’t remember anything beyond Met Gala 2011 and a warm smile.

In her second performance, she has a moment with Karlie and okay she might be flirting with every model on the catwalk ―is the perks of the job― but with Karlie it feels different, almost... intimate which is silly because they only met a few hours ago but there’s something about Karlie already; Taylor doesn’t want to let her go.

She wants to know more about Karlie, wants to ask her why it feels like she has missed her all this time, wants her complications. It would be such a waste to not befriend her, when they already fit together so nicely. Because then the after-party is over and she doesn’t want to lose contact

And so she does, she asks Karlie to hang out with her despite living in different cities and the girl agrees excitedly. They make the most off their bussies schedules, seeing each other more than two people who live in different sides of the country should be able to spend time with each other and Taylor isn’t quite as blue anymore.

And then Karlie suggests that New York is better than London and Taylor suddenly feels like if the city was waiting for her. She chooses light pink skies over greys ones and they spend every time they can together. 

They sit at the top of Taylor’s counter, barefoot and eating their own baked cake, hold hands and go up to the roof with shy smiles and whispered secrets. She learns all there is to learn about Karlie Kloss, unwraps herself in a way she has been cautious since years ago because she wants Karlie to know all that is her as well.

Karlie is like daylight and if colors were emotions, Taylor would be golden.

Taylor shoves all her soulmates thoughts in a box she isn’t ready to open yet because she has never had a friend like Karlie before and she doesn’t want to mess that up. Isn’t it good enough as it is already? Is it worthy to ruin a friendship over something that might not be?

Karlie is one of the best things that has happened to her and she doesn’t want to lose this over something as uncertain as soulmates.

So she ignores it and she’s doing a pretty good job of it until one day when they are cooking at Karlie’s house, she stains her shirt with oil and takes it off, only left in a sports bra and Taylor can’t look away. She gapes at the blank ink just under her left breast and Karlie blinks at her.

“Something you like?”

Taylor blushes a furious red. “Your mark. I didn’t saw it when you walked at Victoria’s.”

“Oh” She furrows her brows. “They make us cover it with special makeup. Don’t you covers yours too?”

Her face feels like it might boil. “Yes, but is on my back so is not hard to hide.”

Karlie’s eye twinkle. “Can I see?”

Taylor feels like shrinking and crawling to a hole forever where soulmates and pretty girls doesn’t exist. “Uh, I don’t know...”

“C’mon, don’t tell me you are shy now. I will show you mine.” Karlie is bouncing with excitement and takes a step closer to Taylor.

This close, Taylor can notice that the tattoo pulled over Karle’s lean skin looks like a half finished―

“A flower?”

“Not any flower. A daisy.”

Taylor gets bolder and runs her fingers through the outline of the petals. She feels Karlie shivering there where her fingertips touch and Karlie looks at her with a dark gaze looking like she wouldn’t care if Taylor does her and undoes her right there.

And Taylor wouldn’t care too.

“How do you know?” She asks instead, keeping her eyes on the flower. “It looks like any flower”

“I have had this thing for over twenty years now, believe me when I say it’s a daisy.” Karlie snorts and with that their moment is gone, the tension going away.

(It’s not what friends do anyways.)

“Is your favorite flower?”

“No, but I hope is my lover’s.” Her eyes get cloudy as they do whenever soulmates are brought up or Taylor bakes her a cake. 

Taylor goes to her Tribecca apartment that night without showing Karlie her mark and feeling like someone had kicked her heart multiple times and she had the tiny hope that her and Karlie...

It’s good enough as it is, she reminds herself and buries her face on her hands.

She doesn’t know the first thing about daises.

//

She takes Karlie on a road trip.

It’s not what friends do, at least not only them in an isolated cabin where mainly couples go but she can pretend and Karlie too.

She plays her 1989 and looks at her Karlie moving with the music, her new muse without knowing it.

And when they arrive Taylor thinks fate really be mocking them because there in the sand a few yellow daises are growing.

She picks one to examine it, thinking how it matches Karlie’s mark when the brunettes catches up to her, waving her arms. “Look at what I drew on the sand!”

She tugs Taylor along, and she closes her fist, keeping the flower in a clammy hand.

“It was right here!” She points to the sand where clearly there isn’t anything.

“The sea must have washed it.”

“Uh, right. I’ll just write it again.”

She starts again with her fingers, her face scrunched in concertation and Taylor can’t resist the impulse. She puts the daisy behind Karlie’s ear and the girl doesn’t even blink.

“What did you do?” She asks, still writing.

“Just gave you something that I hope will remember you of me.”

She smiles and writes _Karlie <3 Taylor _and Taylor takes a picture of it because that’s what friends do.

Karlie doesn’t take the daisy off until they have had dinner, both exhausted and ready to go to bed.

“Oh.” She says looking at the flower with the cloudy eyes Taylor doesn’t want to think about. “It’s a daisy.”

“Yes.” She replies with her tongue feeling like sand.

And if there’s a god, she must be watching out for Taylor tonight because Karlie doesn’t bring up the soulmates subject and deposits the flower carefully over her nightstand. They go to bed together, silence thick when they are under the covers and Taylor thinks Karlie’s green eyes glow like a cat’s in the darkness.

“I really had fun today.” Karlie looks at her with lazy eyes.

“Me too.”

Karlie pauses and closes her eyes and for a moment Taylor thinks she’s already asleep until she hears her voice again,

“You are my best friend.”

The world stops. Because Taylor can stop pretending now, she can stop pretending that she doesn’t want to kiss her best friend, that she is not in love with her best friend. Taylor realizes right there of what she has been missing, what has been standing in front of her this time, and her skin burns, agonizing and slow and she keeps quiet enough to not wake up Karlie.

In the morning, her mark is finished. A pair of wings.

//

Taylor searches frantically for her journal when she gets back home, flickers so quickly through the pages that that she almost tears the paper and feels like she can finally breathe when she puts down her finger in that one page;

_November 13th 2013_

_Angels dancing on snow globes._

She writes a song that day, about best friends and love and doesn’t tell no one about it.

//

She avoids Karlie. It isn’t that hard, really when she has two jets and a tour going on despite living in the same city. She can’t look at her at the face now that she knows she’s her soulmate, doesn’t trust herself to not confess her feelings.

But New York is different now, is Karlie’s as much as is hers and Taylor can’t escape it, she sees the girl everywhere at every turn, stumbles upon billboard after billboard and thinks that fate must be really having a laugh.

She avoids her for nearly a month, keeping just in touch by messages, until one day she’s about to pass out of exhaustion on the couch with friends playing on the background when a loud knock startles her.

It is... weird. Her security always notices her before someone makes it to her door and she’s about to call her number for emergencies thinking some psycho wants to break in when she hears the voice.

“Taylor, open the door please.”

She goes very still and thinks for a moment of acting like she’s not home.

“I can hear the friends background.” The voice continues.

“Shit.”

She walks heavy steps to the front door and opens it, just to reveal Karlie wearing high waisted jeans with a suspender belt, white shirt, hands on her pockets and she has no right to look this handsome when Taylor is trying to avoid her. She resists the urge to hug her.

“Hi.” Karlie smiles shily.

Taylor rises her eyebrows.

“How did you get past my security?”

Karlie smiles but it’s tired and Taylor notices the bags under her eyes. “They have always liked me better.”

Taylor slaps her arm gently. “That’s not true.”

Karlie smirks and Taylor feels so painfully comfortable because this is them, teasing smiles and lingering touches.

“Can I come in?”

“Sure.” Taylor steps sideways and Karlie walks in, looking around as if she had never been here a thousand times before.

“Friends?” She points to the TV.

“Yuh.”

Karlie nods, looking very pensive and Taylor almost wants to tell her to cut the crap when the taller girl opens her mouth.

“Okay, first of all, it sucks that you are avoiding me.” Taylor wants to speak but Karlie cuts her off. “Don’t you even try to deny it Taylor, you being busy wasn’t a excuse before. I even saw you more when you lived in Nashville than this past month. And I thought you needed space but you weren’t even talking to me. And I keep thinking, was it Big Sur? Did I do anything to make you push me away?”

She shakes her head. “You didn’t do anything.”

“Then why? This few weeks without you felt unbearable.” Karlie rubs a hand down Taylor’s arm. “You know you can tell me anything don’t you? Anything.”

“My mark.” Taylor breaths out and she feels like if she’s freefalling. “It got completed.”

“Oh.” Karlie drops her hand and the silence is insupportable. “Mine too, actually.” She says it like is nothing, like if people don’t kill themselves to find their true love, like if that hadn’t put a spin to Taylor’s world.

She wipes her hand to look at Karlie with wide eyes and the girl blushes, stammering.

“It happened while we were apart, I was thinking of how much I missed you and I―.” She presses a hand against her forehead. “God, this is not how I wanted to tell you.”

“Can I see?” Taylor interrupts her and Karlie nods clumsy. She pulls the fabric upwards until Taylor can see the finished mark, a whole daisy with twelve petals.

She circles it with her fingers and Karlie shivers and now they are back to that time again when they first talked about soulmates and unfinished marks.

“Who?” She asks because she has to.

“You seriously don't know?” Karlie looks at her with an expression that speaks thousands and Taylor stumbles backwards, hands falling to her sides.

“It can’t be me Karlie.” She laughs without humor. “I didn’t even know what a daisy was before I met you.”

But the fire on Karlie eyes only burns brighter and she clenches her jaw. “Do you think soulmates are a shallow as that? Aren’t you supposed to be a hopeless romantic?” She keeps talking before Taylor can protest. “Do you even know what a daisy means Taylor?”

“No.” She whispers stubbornly. “I though we had established before that I don’t know much about the flower.”

Karlie doesn’t give up. “It means love, loyalty, happiness. Do you think if I care if you actually know about the flower or not? You are all those things to me Taylor, so you are my daisy.”

Taylor doesn’t get speechless. She always has something to say, always has a quirky comeback at the top of her tongue. But now she is rendered speechless, gaping at Karlie, a feeling, _love_, cursing through her veins and is Karlie’s turn to ask, “Can I see?”

But Taylor can’t reply so she lunches forward and kisses her, grabbing her by the suspenders, in a rough touch of lips trying to put her closer, thinking of only Karlie and how right her lips feels against hers, how nice they fit together.

“Can I see?” Karlie asks again with swollen lips when they pull away and Taylor takes off her shirt and Karlie throws her head back laughing before speaking, “Wings. O f course.” She kisses each of her shoulder plates and Taylor’s whole body tingles. “Of fucking course.”

Later, is Taylor’s turn to kiss each one of the petals.

//

They don’t hide it but they also don’t say nothing about it because they don’t feel like they have to.

And well, if they see hers and a Karlie’s marks finished, holding hands with a blinding smile on their face,

Let them talk.

**Author's Note:**

> kostanation does anyone have the pdf of the seven husbands of evelyn hugo? Havent read an actual book in years but that one book interests me and i have been meaning to read it for a while now...
> 
> ps: this is peak crackhead and tinhatting but what if the netflix documentary is a coming out...


End file.
